Crisscross Signal Spire

The Crisscross Signal Spire marks Dudley Square as a historic urban crossroads and acts as a sculptural beacon that ties past traditions to present-day communication habits. Taking cues from the role of church spires and clock towers, which communicated and marked time through bell chimes or illuminated clock faces, the Crisscross Signal Spire creates a contemporary, three-dimensional impetus for Boston’s municipal government and its citizens. The spire uses real-time lighting and digital interfaces to translate open-source online content from the Citizen's Connect system into a pattern of lighting behavior. The structure of the spire is a braided array of tubes woven together acting as a vertical timeline of Boston’s transformation from three distinct towns into a city of 21 neighborhoods. Crisscross Signal Spire projects the city’s geographic genesis onto the future of Boston’s growth, exchange, movement, and communication.